I
suppose it falls under the general category of promoting tolerance that
a Rutgers sophomore, Dharun Ravi, was convicted of a hate crime for recording
a gay sexual encounter between his roommate, Tyler Clementi, and an older
man with a hidden webcam in a dormitory room. Embarrassed by the exposure,
Clementi jumped to his death from the George Washington bridge.

Clementi’s
suicide is unfortunate but Ravi was no murderer. The definition of
criminal activity has been blown out of proportion by demographic politics.
No longer is a palpable injury required for conviction of a crime; now a
person
can be prosecuted for having the wrong state of mind. I mean “wrong” in
a political sense here. It means being the wrong type of character, fitting
the stereotype of someone who perpetrates violence and hate against one’s
demographic opposite.

Take
a short quiz:

1.
Who is the victim, black or white?
2. Who is the victim, woman or man?
3. Who is the victim, gay person or straight?

If
you answered all three questions correctly by picking the first option,
it shows that you are a genuine American.
No one living in
the United States
during the past twenty or thirty years could have failed to pick up
on the idea that it is white people who consistently abuse blacks, men
who consistently
abuse women, straight people who consistently abuse gays. While human
behavior does not always fit that pattern, the exceptions are ignored.
The press
is simply not interested in them.

But
we are talking about tolerance. I am a white male who feels generally
uncomfortable about two other males
having sex with each
other. Society
allows me to have
that opinion so long as I keep quiet. I am, in fact, personally quite
tolerant of what other people do sexually. If they are consenting
adults who do
not involve me, I feel their type of sexual activity is none of my
business.

It
becomes more complicated when someone who shares my opinion acts upon
it from a position of power. Maybe a business manager
will not
hire known
gays
or a landlord refuses to rent to them because of personal attitudes.
Then intolerance must be actively thwarted by the government.

Tolerance
is then no longer a matter of personal choice; it becomes a government
mandate. Someone - the government - is forcing someone
else
- me - to be
tolerant under penalty of law. Government is not tolerating what
it considers to be
intolerant behavior or thought. That is a phony idea. Tolerance
is not the coercive invasion of someone else’s identity.

If
this is not paradox enough, the law and public opinion dogmatically assign
the intolerant role to a particular demographic type -
the white, male, or
straight person. In other words, the society’s power
structure discriminates while professing to be fighting discrimination.
Paradoxes abound.

The
rationale in all three cases is that minority groups are
vulnerable to majority abuse. Intuitively, we fear that members
of a majority
group will
oppress minorities or, at least, if they are the victim,
they will be able to find plentiful allies to protect them in case
of danger.
Our
dominant
politics does not countenance the idea of the tyranny of
minorities. Yet, minority groups,
by their very fear and paranoia, have effectively banded
together in coherent groups to exercise disproportionate, even iron-clad,
influence
upon public
policy.

I
have no problem with minorities banding together to fight crimes against
themselves. What, however, is a crime? It
used to be
an act of violence.
If someone physically injures someone else or injures the
other in a substantial way, that is a crime. “Sticks
and stones can break your bones but words will never hurt
you” - that was the old, common-sense approach to
justice. Thoughts are not criminal.

Under
the new regime, however, one must be proactive about
possible crimes. If someone is thinking a thought that
can lead to a crime,
we must nip
it in the bud before the dangerous thought comes to fruition.
Why not consider the
thought already a crime? Hateful thoughts sometimes lead
to bad behavior. To express or exhibit hate is therefore
potentially
criminal. Congress
has
the
power to make this attitude a crime prosecutable by the
state.

Dharun
Ravi was convicted of a hate crime. The punishment is up to ten years
in prison and possible deportation
to India.
Ravi
did not
assault
his victim
or cause a physical injury. He embarrassed his victim
by broadcasting a sexual encounter recorded by a web
cam.
Yes, this was an
invasion of Clementi’s
privacy. It was certainly an unkind act. However, there
are civil laws to deal with such deeds. It was Clementi,
not Ravi, who brought real injury upon himself
by jumping off the bridge.

My
general attitude about such things is that life sometimes or often brings
unpleasant experiences. Being
bullied
is part of the
process
of growing
up. The strong pick on the weak. Confident persons
pick on those who betray vulnerability.
Gay teenagers in predominantly straight company have
more than their share of such problems. But is the
solution to bullying
by a 100-pound
boy to
bring in the 800-pound bully (which is the law) to
adjust the power relationships? It seems to me this
is unhelpful,
even
wrong. Changing
power relationships
between persons or groups is not a legitimate function
of government.

I
remember when I was a boy, we used to throw stones at each other in the
alley. This was rough play but
no one
was hurt.
I remember
once enlisting
the help
of a grown man to throw stones at our adversaries
who was foolish enough to oblige. The other side
was routed.
At
the time, this
event was quite
exciting. In retrospect, it seems not to have been
such a good idea. I
now believe
that
adults should not take part in the more competitive
aspects of children’s
play.

Today,
we have state legislators who pass “anti-bullying” legislation
that criminalizes certain behavior existing among
children. In effect, it mandates that the police
will intervene in power struggles taking place
at an early
age. The cure is, in my estimation, worse than
the disease. The government should leave children
alone to be children. We do not need grown-up “bullies”,
armed law-enforcement officers, in the school
yard.

Other
legislators enact and toughen “domestic
abuse” laws that
intervene in power struggles between family
members, especially those involving husband
and wife.
In this case, women are considered to be the
victimized minority
who need to be protected by the government.
The law maintains that women are inherently
so weak-minded,
vulnerable, or susceptible to pressure that
they will not be allowed to drop the charges
against
a male partner having once
made an accusation. It is claimed that domestic
abuse is an offense against the state.

As
a point of disclosure, I am myself the defendant
in a trial next week involving false charges
of assault brought against
me by my
wife with
assistance from her
divorce attorney. Having pled guilty once before
to a similar
charge, I am facing up to a year in prison
if a jury finds me guilty
in the recent
incident.
(Note:
Since writing this, the city attorney has decided
to dismiss the charges against me.)

Because
I did not actually assault my wife, I am also being prosecuted on the
charge
of inflicting
fear.
Yes, my wife
sounded afraid
when she interrupted
a 911 call that I had placed and spoke with
the operator.
However, the law states
that I must intentionally have induced fear
of imminent physical harm to commit
a crime of domestic abuse.

Again,
criminal law seems to be moving away from punishing actual physical harm
to punishing
a
person’s state of mind. I can be
found guilty if I exhibit a particular
state of
mind - intending to cause fear in my wife
- or, in practice,
even if the alleged victim exhibits a state
of mind - actually being afraid. This kind
of subjective, politicized justice may
eventually bring the whole house
down - either that or we will become inured
to living in a police state.

In
conclusion, this so-called “tolerance” has
gone too far in my opinion. After the
Ravi conviction, some legal scholars were speculating
that
parents and other adults now have an
obligation to teach children not to hate gays. They
had an obligation to tell them to think
in a certain way. This is
demographic politics masquerading as
tolerance. It is wrong both because of the one-sided
characterization of victims and oppressors
and, more importantly, its
invasion of the sacred sanctuary of each
human being, which is the person’s
own heart and mind.

Government
ought not be allowed to enter into the place
of individual conscience.
If need
be, we
need another
article in the Bill of
Rights to state unequivocally
that no government entity - federal,
state, or local - has the authority
to pass that kind of law. Human thought
is and ought to remain free of
coercion by lawmakers
and the police.